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The Lost Migration
(will code this later!) '' ''the lost migration a short story by stork preface The flood was the worst we’d ever seen. Our home was completely lost. The cave we stayed in was entirely flooded, and we watched cats die. We lost sight of our beach and haven’t seen it since. We were in paradise, and it was just gone, right before our eyes. My name is Ripplestar. My leadership witnessed the fall of OceanClan. Our home was a cave and a surrounding beach. We had dens carved in each corner by the soft rain that would come. Our queens got the driest part and I suffered the wettest fate. It was an oath taken by me and every OceanClan leader before me. Our beach led to many cats getting together and a wonderful place for our apprentices to go. They stood watch on the beach for their warrior ceremonies, to be blessed with both StarClan and the ocean itself. We hunted in the woods not far away. We fed on fish and forest food both in our diets. Our medicine cats soaked seaweed in fresh water to be rid of the burning elements in it. Then the flood came. We evacuated as many cats as we could. I watched kits be swept up with their mothers who couldn’t escape. I watched two of our elders drown. I saw one apprentice get trapped, and another get crushed. I’m plagued by the guilt of them even now. Now, those of us who escaped are homeless. Nobody knows who we are... The lost migration has begun with those of us who survived. one - sandwhisker I remember when the flood came. Ripplestar’s leadership was young. She’d only just gone from her old name - Ripplebreeze - to her leader name, and yet, something was bound to go wrong. We would contact StarClan by heading further down the beach and to a wave-washed rock that jutted out of the ground. It was massive, and constantly got splashed - but it was said that the waves connected us to our ancestors, as well as being under the moon. Ripplestar and her medicine cat, Patchpool, would constantly discuss what was happening. The worst part was that nobody knew when it was going to happen, and it did, at one of the worst times. The peak of newleaf. Queens struggled to escape. The leafbare before had killed many of our cats due to illness, and the fact that there were three queens was the most prosperous thing we could imagine. We lost two of them in the flood. We narrowly escaped into the forest, the remaining ones. It hit during the night. The survivors? Ripplestar, Patchpool, two terrified apprentices, and a trio of warrior siblings, along with a singular queen... I was that queen. When the storm had long passed, Ripplestar was devastated. Patchpool had tried desperately to calm her down, to make her feel like all of the deaths we had weren’t her fault, but she couldn’t be convinced. “The only thing I have left,” she sighed, “is you all.” We had an even four she-cats and four toms, and the eight of us were now stranded. “What do we do now, Ripplestar?” I asked quietly. “Well, Sandwhisker... I don’t know. But we need to move. Our home is destroyed; we must find a new one. And... we need to find them. The Clans of legend.” “What?!” Flameclaw called, his eyes wide, one of the trio. “But the Clans haven’t been found in years!” Icewing sputtered. “What will we do if we find them?” Thunderfang yelled. “Alright you three, settle down.” She didn’t seem annoyed - Ripplestar was very good at keeping a level head - but her voice was stern. “Here’s our plan.” “We move in the direction of the sun. When StarClan mentioned this flood, I was told to follow the sunset. That will lead us to wherever we want to go. Our goal is to find the old Clans and make a home for ourselves. Provided we do find them, we introduce ourselves. Any questions? Concerns?” “What about my kits?” I couldn’t resist bringing it up - after all, I was the last queen. “Sandwhisker, when your kits come, we’ll rest and let you support them. But until then, we must keep moving. Any other concerns?” “Yes, Ripplestar.” Creekpaw and his friend - Dovepaw - had stopped shivering. “We didn’t want to disturb you while you were talking, nor did we mention this to anyone whatsoever, but... Dovepaw has kits of her own coming. Soon.” She’d raised an eyebrow, and Dovepaw shivered, but the calico leader shook her head. “There is nothing we can do about having two queens. Let us be happy for the two we have.” We began our journey the very next day. I stuck with Dovepaw - I wanted to discuss about being a queen. “Hey, Dovepaw. Doing okay?” Her coat was quite pretty; silver and black tabby with the brightest blue eyes a cat could ever see. “Sort of. How do you do it, Sandwhisker?” “Queenship?” “Yeah, like.” She struggled to walk; her belly had already begun to swell a bit. “Managing this thing.” “I breathe, for one thing. You’re baring the next generation beyond our small party. How far along are you?” “Almost there, I think. You?” “Also soon.” We had no conversation through the rest of it, only followed Ripplestar. We placed a lot of trust in her, our leader, to guide us. We would walk until our paws hurt. That first night, I heard Dovepaw start yelling. “Sandwhisker?! I’m - I’m in a lot of pain - is this what kitting feels like?!” I couldn’t answer - this was my first litter, and she’d been so much further than I’d realized. “Patchpool!!” She yelled for hours, and my ears had started to hurt. They were Creekpaw's, of course, and he watched over her, making sure she was okay. Sometime later the screams would stop, and the rest of us glanced over at Patchpool for guidance. "She's gone." His eyes were dark. "She had five kits, two of which were stillborn. The other three... Sandwhisker, can you take them?" "Um..." It was hard to say; I easily could've seen myself having the same. "I'll take them. For Dovepaw." "For Dovepaw," the remaining cats echoed. He placed the three by my side, each of different colors. One was a silver tabby, like his mother, with a lighter silver tone over his body. Raccoonkit. Another, chocolate, like Creekpaw's father. Larkkit. The last - brown tabby, a bit of a combo between both his parents. Pikekit. I didn't tell their names, not immediately. Creekpaw buried Dovepaw by himself, away from everyone else. In his mind, the grief he felt was different from everyone else's, and as his wails rang out into the forest, Ripplestar came to check on me. "How are you feeling, Sandwhisker?" "I'm doing okay with them. As for me... Ripplestar, what if I can't handle them all?" "You will. I know it's hard," she sighed. "My mother had to do something similar. I was with six other kits; we had only two queens and one had died in the process. So her four kits came with my mother, who birthed three more. Somehow I, the runt, lasted the longest." "You were the runt of the whole thing?! I would've never thought!" "Lies, I was. The smallest, and only calico. And she saw something special in me." Her eyes were wistful, and somewhat sad. "It was all before you were born." "I know you're not that much older than me, Ripplestar." She glanced over at me. "You've never once expressed interest in anyone. If anything, I'd expect you to be with Patchpool. Even if he is a medicine cat." "A leader and a medicine cat being mates is definitely something unusual." She watched Creekpaw come back to the group, then abruptly left to comfort him. We would leave again, a few days later. two - patchpool I failed my Clan when I let the queens die. There were two queens and Sandwhisker. One of them was kitting when the flood hit. I couldn’t save her. I’d felt terrible because I chose to save myself - and not her. Ripplestar and I exited after Creekpaw came back. We didn’t speak until we were away from everyone, and she sighed when she stared up at the moon. “Patchpool,” she murmured, “I can’t believe I failed.” “What?! You, a failure?!? Not at all!!” I stared at her with wide, disbelieving eyes. “If anything, I failed. I left a queen to die. I let so many cats die because I couldn’t save her and the other queen -“ “I’m their leader.” Her eyes were heavy with emotion. “I should’ve done more.” “No, no, no... Ripplestar, don’t beat yourself up.” I shushed her gently, and she blinked at the ground. “Please.” “I...” “You need to be there for them. They rely on you. They need you there!!” She blinked at me for a moment, then took a deep breath. “No, you’re right. I can’t be so upset. I can’t, I can’t.” “We can’t give up.” * We kept moving. Sandwhisker needed help carrying the three kits she had, and I would check on her daily to make sure she was alright. Ripplestar followed the sun each day, and we rested at night. One day, however... Flameclaw, Icewing, and Thunderfang insisted on going hunting together, and I stayed with Ripplestar, Creekpaw, and Sandwhisker. The queen nursed Creekpaw’s kits with extreme care, and the apprentice regularly studied them. “Creekpaw.” He looked over at me, ginger tail twitching. “Yeah?” “How’d Dovepaw get away with it?” “In not telling you? I don’t know.” He stared over at his sons. “She did what she wanted, and that included not telling you. Sandwhisker seems to be a good mother to them.” “Yes, but I’m worried about her... Ripplestar.” She glanced over at me. “I know this is temporary, but Sandwhisker is dangerously close to kitting. I need to care for her.” “We can stay, if that’s what you’re insisting.” She heard the trio of warriors enter with prey for the Clan. “I also need to discuss something with you.” “I don’t know where the Clans are,” she gasped. “All I’ve been doing is following what StarClan told me, because I was visited. I couldn’t believe it, but the ones who told me... Mistystar, Firestar, Tallstar, Rowanstar. I thought it was them, anyway...” “What did they look like, Ripplestar?” I had to be sure; they could have easily been fakes. “Well... Firestar was ginger. Bright green eyes. He was one of ThunderClan’s greatest leaders.” Sounds like him. Okay... “He, um, didn’t say anything to me. None of them did, a-actually...” Wait. What?! “They had to have said something.” “Nothing. Everyone’s losing hope in us... Even our ancestors...” She was pacing now. “What do we do?!?” “Ripplestar, breathe!!” Her terrified eyes were hard to meet. “Forget about their hopeless attitudes. We gotta survive, and defy our ancestors.” I had to pause and breathe myself. “The flood destroyed our home, but it can’t destroy our spirit. So we must hold on, we’ve got to, for all our sakes!!” “But - but -“ “And you’re our leader!!! You’re our guiding light! Our Clan needs you, Ripplestar...” “Patchpool...” “You can do it, I know you can.” She sighed, took a breath, and opened her eyes to a newfound anxious determination. “You’re right. I’m gonna do my best.” tbc! c: Category:Fan Fictions Category:Stormver's Fanfiction